Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Jim Prentice Does "Preposterous"

I wonder if Prentice realizes that he makes no sense whatsoever? There he was today on television, his main message coming out of climate talks- not only are the tar sands not a point of concern, NOBODY even mentioned them in conversation. The sentiment is expressed in this article, which just happens to detail all his actions to address the concerns that don't exist:

Mr. Prentice said it was "preposterous" for environmental groups to claim his mission in Washington was to seek a special deal for oil from the Alberta oil sands. The oil sands were not mentioned once during the two days of climate meetings among ministers from 17 nations, he said.

Not mentioned, not once, read my lips. Prentice is trying to downplay, fair enough, but how can he actually utter that crap, when he's concurrently tells us what he is doing to stop measures which will harm the tar sands:

Federal Environment Minister Jim Prentice on Tuesday said the Conservative government has "issues" with a draft bill that would make it increasingly difficult for U.S. refineries to sell fuel from the carbon emission-intensive oil sands.

In effect, the rules would force U.S. refiners to measure carbon intensity of a fuel from ‘wells to wheels.' Because the life cycle emissions from oil sands crude is up to 30% higher than in conventional oil, Canadian officials are worried the country's energy industry would be devastated by a national low carbon fuel standard in the U.S.

Canada's concerns about the U.S. climate bill follows "the same logic" as objections Ottawa raised last week in a failed bid to derail the California measures, Mr. Prentice said following two days of meetings in Washington.

In a letter last week to California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, federal Natural Resources Minister Lisa Raitt said the state's low carbon fuel standard "discriminated" against oil sands oil and "could be perceived as an unfair trade barrier" between the two countries.

"I think the practicality of it was raised in some detail in terms of rendering it operational," added Mr. Prentice.

The environment minister was in Washington to attend a climate summit organized by the White House for 17 large carbon-emitting nations. He also met with U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu to discuss the Clean Energy Dialogue established between Ottawa and Washington during President Barack Obama's visit to Canada in February

Prentice has spent two days trying to ensure that any American initiative doesn't punish high carbon imports from Canada, but nobody spoke about the high carbon imports from Canada. I don't know what's more frightening, that he actually isn't aware of the absurd logic proposed, or that he thinks nobody will notice how "preposterous" he sounds.